Thursday, April 11

We were fed again for breakfast. Fed really really well. Here is an incredible story: Arnold had a buttered piece of bread. He reached for a nice box with a clown on it. I was like, "ooo, what's that?" HE STARTS POURING IT ONTO HIS BREAD AND IT'S CHOCOLATE JIMMIES!! I thought he was joking! But no! God bless the Dutch and their chocolate jimmie sandwiches for breakfast! I decided I needed one of these sandwiches, but I made mine super-bonus-chocolatey with some stuff I thought would be like nutella, but basically turned out to be more like pure chocolate frosting. Wow. Now there is a photo I'm really sad I lost.

Then alas, it was time to leave. We bid a fond farewell to Arnold and headed out of town. We passed the Pannekoek-ship on the way out of town. It was at this point when all my photos disappeared. Then it was off thru Germany. We stopped at a rest stop and there was a swan nearby. We went to look at it and it hissed at Sean. Sean didn't have the best time in Germany.

boothnavy and flat german scenery.

So that thing about people driving insanely fast in Germany? It's true. It was scary. And considering the rough night Boothnavy had, he was feeling rather sluggish to say the least. Not so good with a full day's drive ahead of us. We had to talk about Evel Kneivel to keep him awake. We stopped at a nice rest stop that had fun energy drinks with photos of topless girlies on the cans. But we ended up buying "Red Bat." Mmmmm. It seemed to do the trick.

The Puttgarten-Rodby Ferry

Once we reached Puttgarten, we had to get on a ferry to take us over to Denmark. That was a pretty cool experience. The weather was all bleak and gray. It just sorta worked. It didn't take long, about 40 minutes, and lo and behold, we were in Denmark. We drove for a while and pulled over at a rest stop to get some food. The Danish language sure has some good words. Then the boys coached me on the finer points of picking up groupies. Don't know if they really know what they're talking about, but probably more than I do, anyway. Too late for me though, I missed out on that cute Dutch boy who said we reminded him of Takako Minekawa. Sigh. Anyway, as we were driving along, this car comes up behind us starts flashing his lights. So we let him pass, and he just stops. In front of us. On the highway. We were confused. We pull up beside him and Tony asks him what's up.
"You have your fog lights on!" he says.
"Oh."
"It's not foggy!"
"Uh...okay. Thanks."
So we turned our fog lights off.

this bag provided us with boundless amusement. (that last word there is "smag," sorry)

As we approached Copenhagen, our wonderful MapBlast directions got a bit hazy. We were supposed to stay on E20. Really, we were. I'm not a bad navigator. I was just following the directions. We drove past some Copenhagen exits. Then we drove past the airport. We were like "well, it must be the next exit..." Then we entered a tunnel. The Duke said "I hope this isn't a long tunnel"... (you can probably guess what happens next). In fact it was a VERY long tunnel. And then at the end of the tunnel, we were on a bridge. An extremely long bridge. The longest tunnel/bridge combination in the world, according to Rick. And no way of turning around. We were in Sweden. It was a pleasant enough scenic detour until we reached the toll at the end and they made us pay 30 euros. Ouch. It was a very nice bridge, as the nice toll booth lady pointed out. Not 30 euros worth of nice, but at least they let us go back over for free.

Back in Denmark, we decided to abandon our directions and just find our way to Copenhagen and go from there. We stopped at a gas station and asked for directions, and a very nice cab driver volunteered to lead us to Lasse's place. For free! Danes: really cool people. And they all speak English. So great! (And we NEVER would have found Lasse's on our own, either.) Anyway, we called Si Señor, who were finishing up band practice, and Lasse, Jakob, and Laura biked on down to meet us. I mean, we would have been happy enough to see them anyway, but after our long day of traveling and detours, we were ready to weep with joy when they showed up. We all headed upstairs and hung out, and Whomas showed up, and then we all went out to get some falafel. The guy at the falafel shop was really mean though! Almost comically so. I don't know if it was because we were American, or he was just cranky or what, but he made it pretty obvious that he did not like us. And the hummus had too much dill in it.

quote of the day: "I feel like I just drank dirty, sudsy dishwater. It's not bad though." -- the Duke, after trying some of Boothnavy's La Binchoise beer.